Exercise has moderate-to-large effects on muscle strength, body composition, physical functioning and inflammation in older adults. Future studies should focus on the influence of specific exercise modalities and target the frail population more.

Background A chronic low-grade inflammatory profile (CLIP) is associated with sarcopenia in older adults. Protein and Vitamin (Vit)D have immune-modulatory potential, but evidence for effects of nutritional supplementation on CLIP is limited. Aim To investigate whether 13 weeks of nutritional supplementation of VitD and leucine-enriched whey protein affected CLIP in subjects enrolled in the PROVIDE-study, as a secondary analysis. Methods Sarcopenic adults (low skeletal muscle mass) aged ≥ 65 years with mobility limitations (Short Physical Performance Battery 4–9) and a body mass index of 20–30 kg/m 2 were randomly allocated to two daily servings of active ( n = 137, including 20 g of whey protein, 3 g of leucine and 800 IU VitD) or isocaloric control product ( n = 151) for a double-blind period of 13 weeks. At baseline and after 13 weeks, circulating interleukin (IL)-8, IL-1 receptor antagonist (RA), soluble tumor-necrosis-factor receptor (sTNFR)1, IL-6, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, pre-albumin and 25-hydroxyvitamin(OH)D were measured. Data-analysis included repeated measures analysis of covariance (corrected for dietary VitD intake) and linear regression. Results IL-6 and IL-1Ra serum levels showed overall increases after 13 weeks ( p = 0.006 and p < 0.001, respectively). For IL-6 a significant time × treatment interaction ( p = 0.046) was observed, with no significant change over time in the active group ( p = 0.155) compared to control (significant increase p = 0.012). IL-8 showed an overall significant decrease ( p = 0.03). The change in pre-albumin was a significant predictor for changes in IL-6 after 13 weeks. Conclusions We conclude that 13 weeks of nutritional supplementation with VitD and leucine-enriched whey protein may attenuate the progression of CLIP in older sarcopenic persons with mobility limitations. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s40520-019-01208-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Nine weeks of resistance training-irrespective of the external load-have beneficial effects on circulating IL-8 and IL-6. In addition, training at high external load increases the anti-inflammatory cytokines sTNFR1 and IL-1RA. The results of this study show that resistance training has anti-inflammatory effects in healthy young persons and that the response of the different inflammatory mediators depends on the magnitude of the external load.

Our results show that only the mixed-low-resistance training program with a very high number of repetitions at a sufficiently high external resistance was able to increase circulating BDNF in older male participants. Training to volitional fatigue might be necessary to obtain optimal results. Additional studies are needed to unravel the underlying mechanisms, as well as to confirm the observed gender difference.